


oh lover, please don't go.

by TheLittleSongbird



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Jester Lavorre Needs a Hug, POV Jester Lavorre, Self-Loathing Caleb Widogast, Spoilers for episode 104, The Nein are here but they don't interact, aka canon Caleb Widogast
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-30
Updated: 2020-07-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:54:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25615426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLittleSongbird/pseuds/TheLittleSongbird
Summary: Jester wipes her nose on her sleeve and stretches her legs out again. “Why did you say it like that?”“Like what?”“You said ‘I can send you back to Nicodranas.’ Why say ‘send you’ like you’re not coming with us?”Caleb has a plan and Jester isn't okay with it.
Relationships: Jester Lavorre/Caleb Widogast
Comments: 12
Kudos: 151





	oh lover, please don't go.

**Author's Note:**

> Had to get this out before the new episode completely negates it because I'm preeety sure Vokodo is getting fought tonight. But 3am thoughts of "what if Caleb wants to stay on Rumblecusp to erase the memories of his past" crept into my brain and refused to leave.

Her charcoal scribbles mindlessly over the page in her sketchbook. _Horns. Long, dark, curly hair. A warm smile._ If she had time to paint, she’d be sure to match the red of her mother’s skin perfectly. She knows it by heart, after all. She would never forget what her Mama looks like.

But she had.

Jester feels the sting of tears and looks up to the sky, blinking them away. She thought she was protected – thought the Traveler was watching over her, and even if he couldn’t do anything about the memory loss, he wouldn’t let her forget Marion. But he knew about the island. Knew about Vokodo’s hold over the people of Vo, knew he was leading his followers to have their memories erased. And the entire Nein was at risk. Because of Travelercon. Because of Artagan. Because of _her._

The sky begins to darken, the warm light of the sun reflecting off the pool and scattering into millions of rainbow droplets from the spray of the waterfall. She can see Veth, Beau, and Fjord on the outskirts of the forest, keeping watch for any creatures that might still be lingering in the trees. Yasha, Caduceus, and Vilya sit by the edge of the pool, Yasha soaking her feet in the cool water. Despite Caduceus’s recent episode in the underwater tunnels, he appears as unflappable as always, eyes closed and humming around his teacup. And then there was Caleb.

Caleb.

Jester looks behind her to watch as Caleb scratches glyphs and runes into the sand, preparing the dome for the night. Jester wanders idly if he would once again fill the inside with the Nein’s shared memories or forgo it. _It didn’t seem to have much of an effect this morning_ , Jester thinks sadly. She hopes he still offers it – even if it didn’t deter Vokodo’s powers, she enjoyed reliving the moments of their friendship together.

Slipping her sketchbook back into her haversack, Jester stands up from the section of beach she had claimed for herself, the sand cool beneath her bare feet. She pads over towards Caleb and watches him silently, following the movement of his hands guiding the stick he used like a paintbrush to finish a glyph.

_He has elegant hands._

It was not the first time Jester has thought as much. Everything about Caleb, Caleb _now_ , not Caleb _then_ , was elegant. She didn’t realize it when they first met, when he was all covered in dirt and bandages and she was infatuated with Fjord. Fjord was rugged, handsome in the way Jester read about in fairytales and heard in songs that were sung late at night in the Chateau. Caleb was handsome too, but in every way Fjord wasn’t. His fingers were long and thin, the tips covered in soot that still refused to come out in the bath. His frame was slight, now that he was no longer swimming in his coat. And his jaw was sharp, tapering to a dimpled chin that would make him look boyish if it wasn’t for the perpetual dark circles under his eyes.

He was elegant. There was no other word for it.

Plopping onto the ground a few feet from Caleb, Jester draws her knees to her chest and rests her head atop them, keeping her gaze on Caleb as he finishes the last line of the spell. Satisfied, he leans back against his hands as the dome shimmers into view.

“Should we call the group over?” he asks, catching her eye before nodding towards the pool.

Jester shrugs. “They’ll come over when they’re ready.” Something coils in her stomach, and she can’t pinpoint why, but she knows she doesn’t want to stray far away from the dome. She feels safer here, away from the water. Away from everything.

Caleb’s gaze focuses on her charcoal covered fingers. “Were you drawing?”

“Yeah,” Jester clutches her haversack closer, as if it might disappear at any moment. “I was drawing Mama. Because of… you know.” She waves vaguely towards her own head. _Because I was stupid and let a not-God erase my memories this morning._

“Ah. Right.” Caleb frowns, and Jester can see the sadness creeping into his eyes. His eyes are always so sad. “This is a uh… a bit of a pickle we’ve gotten ourselves into, huh?”

“That _I_ got us into.” Jester mumbles, burrowing her face a little deeper into her rumpled skirts.

“You didn’t know. You cannot blame yourself for something you couldn’t have foreseen.”

Another shrug. “Yeah, I guess.” Silence falls. Jester wishes Caleb had turned Frumpkin back into a cat, so she could scratch behind his ears and calm her racing thoughts. “Caleb,” her voice sounds childish even to her own ears. She hates it, hates that she sounds so scared, so vulnerable.

“Ja, Blueberry?”

Jester blinks back another flood of tears, a laugh escaping from her throat unbidden. Laughing at the nickname. Laughing at her own foolishness. She’s not sure which.

“I don’t want to forget my mom. I don’t want to forget anyone, and the longer we stay here, the bigger the chances are that we….” She can’t finish the thought, rubbing her nose into her skirts to stave off the crying. She always cries around Caleb. _Stupid, childish girl._

“Hey,” Jester hears shuffling along the sand, and as she peeks up from her knees, she sees Caleb’s hand outstretched as if to comfort her. His hand stills in the space between them, then falls back into his lap, forgotten. But his eyes remain on her, conviction glowing in his blue eyes. “I will get you back to your mother. If we can’t beat this thing, then the moment you want to leave, I will get you and the Nein out of here. I can send you back to Nicodranas like that,” he snaps his fingers together. “The second you say ‘go’. And you will go.” His lips lift in a sad smile, and Jester spares an idle thought for how elegant those lips are.

But something in his words doesn’t settle properly.

Jester wipes her nose on her sleeve and stretches her legs out again. “Why did you say it like that?”

“Like what?”

“You said ‘I can send you back to Nicodranas.’ Why say ‘send you’ like you’re not coming with us?”

Silence falls once more. Jester searches Caleb’s face, watches as his smile gradually drops, the sadness seeping into his eyes. He looks away, blinking out towards the waterfall before them.

And then it clicks. Jester feels her heart pounding in her ears.

“You want to stay.”

She speaks in a whisper, but the finality of it feels like she might as well scream it into the trees, the sound echoing all around her. The air seems to leave the space around them, the two of them trapped in their own bubble, oxygen and sound choking around them.

Caleb doesn’t look back at her. Jester’s heart continues to pound.

“Caleb.”

He still doesn’t look back.

“ _Caleb.”_ Before she can take a moment to think, she’s on her knees and sitting in front of Caleb, his face in her hands as she _pulls_ him towards her, forcing him to look at her.

The sadness that looks back in his eyes is devastating.

Caleb’s voice is barely a whisper. “There are… there are things in my past… they are not kind memories, Jester.”

“You mean like Icky-thong. And Astrid.”

“Not just that,” Caleb takes her hand in his and pulls it from his face. He doesn’t let it go. “It might not be bad. To forget. To shed the _fucking weight_ of it all.”

Her throat burns with another wave of tears waiting to be shed. But as she holds them back, she realizes she’s not upset with Caleb. She’s _angry._

“So what? You just… stay here and forget all of us? Forget Beau? Forget _Veth?_ ” Forget _me_ , she doesn’t say.

Caleb shuts his eyes, his face scrunched up the way it does when he’s battling with himself. “You don’t understand. I have plans, plans that I can’t ignore. Plans that will _hurt you_ , Jester. And the last thing I want to do is hurt you.”

“If you leave, _that would hurt me._ ” She’s crying now, and she doesn’t care, doesn’t give a shit that there’s snot running down her nose or her eyes are bloodshot. “You think you’re the only one who would be effected if you stayed here? We love you, Caleb. We aren’t the Mighty Nein without you.” Her heart pounds as she openly sobs, her grip tightening around Caleb’s hand as she fists her other hand into his shirt. Anything to keep him close, keep him with her. _Don’t go,_ she whispers in her heart, _Stay with me. Stay with me. Stay with me._

“Jester…” his voice cracks with pain, “You need to stay safe, and I can’t do that—"

“No! That’s bullshit, Caleb. You keep saying that – you keep saying that you’re going to hurt me, or that you’re a bad person, but you aren’t! I _know_ you. You’re kind and sweet, and you’re always nice to me and listen to me when I’m having a bad day. You never talk down to me or treat me like a child. If you leave, who’s going to protect us every night with the dome? Who’s going to be my polymorph buddy? Whose book am I gonna doodle dicks in?” She sniffles and leans into his space, resting her forehead on his chest, squeezing the fabric of his shirt in her fist. She watches as teardrops fall and land on his knee. She lowers her voice to a whisper, hoping he doesn’t hear. “Who’s going to show me pretty lights just to make me feel better?”

A moment passes. In the trees, Jester can hear the chirping of cicadas in the night air.

Then, an arm wraps around her waist and pulls her close, tucking her neatly into Caleb’s chest. She feels the weight of his head resting atop hers, and the closeness grounds her in a way their moments of affection in the past hadn’t. Caleb hasn’t initiated physical intimacy before, and now that she has it, Jester craves it deep in her soul. He’s so warm.

“I’m so sorry, Blueberry,” he whispers into her hair, and the nickname brings with it a new wave of tears that disappear into his shirt. “It was a silly thought. I didn’t… it doesn’t matter what I thought. I’m not going anywhere. I promise.”

“You better not,” she says into his shirt, “I’ll drag you back to Nicodranas with us if I have to.”

He chuckles. “I believe it. You are very strong.”

“The strongest.”

“ _Ja._ In more ways than one.” He presses his lips to her hair.

Jester’s heart stutters.

_Oh._

She’s positive that Caleb can’t see the way her cheeks are burning a deep purple, but she buries her face further into his chest all the same. Caleb squeezes her in response, and the easy affection, something so rare and precious being given to Jester without a thought makes her want to cry. She wants to stay like this forever, tucked into the space that Caleb reserves for his books, for his magic. She wants to feel his lithe arms wrapped around her, keeping her safe and warm, warded from the dangers of the outside world. She wants to fall asleep just like this, and not worry about Gods and wars and evil school teachers.

She knows it can’t last, as a cool rush of wind carries the sea spray from the waterfall to glance over her arms. She knows they’ll have to pull away, when the Nein decide to settle down for the night to take on Vokodo in the morning. She knows that Caleb will shrink back into himself the way he always does, keeping his feelings guarded and encased in amber. But she still yearns.

Jester hopes Caleb will cast Programmed Image tonight on the inside of the dome. Hopes that he can include this moment and place it near her bedroll before she drifts off to sleep.

Because she doesn’t want to forget.


End file.
